


Apollo and Hyacinth: Long Distance

by Annie Christ (SmokedSalmon)



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Pretentious
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-20
Updated: 2015-05-20
Packaged: 2018-03-31 10:59:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3975580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SmokedSalmon/pseuds/Annie%20Christ
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Axel and Roxas meet as pretentious middle schoolers roleplaying Sonic the Hedgehog original characters only to reconnect years later through a terrible blogging website as a potential Philosophy major and already freshman Classics major. An embarrassingly pretentious rendition of their relationship, it doesn't matter how much you know about Plato's Allegory of the Cave or how fluent you are in Greek and Latin. At the end of the day, you're still a huge fucking nerd with a Sonic inspired Skype username and composition notebooks full of information about your two-toned hair Sonic persona named Tenshi. Yes, that's Japanese for 'angel.'</p>
            </blockquote>





	Apollo and Hyacinth: Long Distance

**Author's Note:**

> For Heartumbles the Hedgehog Fucker

Had he taken the time to genuinely think about it, then Roxas would've been able to trace his inclination (i.e. obsession) with web forums back to the medieval renaissance of his middle school career. Socializing had been synonymous with slaughterhouses from an early age, and when the infectious dramatics of prepubescent tragedy had cast its neon glow upon Roxas' friend group, he'd quietly dismantled himself from the hierarchy of junior high. Unfortunately for him, and the continuity of his social life, Roxas replaced the social anchoring of public school with the World Wide Web, specifically the 4Kids forums. With can after can of RC clenched between his sweaty hands, Roxas spent his afternoons seated at the family computer, surfing through posts specifically dedicated to the closest thing to a One True Love he'd yet to have; Knuckles the Echidna.

Roxas usually liked the stoic type, making Shadow seem like the obvious choice, but there was incentive in Knuckles being the last of his clan, because then Roxas could daydream about being there for him in his shroud of self-sufficiency. The mysterious and angst-driven allure of a loner kept him sifting through the Sonic Wiki, noting everything he could about the character, and eventually forcing Roxas to keep a small composition notebook of information about Knuckles, the theories his excessive fanfiction reading inspired, and especially his hate for Rogue. It was entirely by chance he was directed to what would become his pedestal in the Sonic the Hedgehog fandom and why – nearly ten years later – his password and occasional username would still be 'roxas_th.'

"Did you drink the last goddamn soda?" His mom's yell echoed into the computer room.

Roxas expertly licked the tab of his can while copy-pasting a roleplay profile template into his Word document. He furrowed his brow and yelled back. " _You_  did! _"_

"You know that chair is starting to smell like you!" She stopped screaming when she appeared in the doorway, and Roxas' fingers twitched he exited out of the browser so fast, pulling up the same Power Point slide he'd been staring at for two hours. "I'm making Hamburger Helper."

"Gross," he muttered. "Can't we get McDonalds?"

"No, Stinky Boy. I'm going to pretend I mother you by cooking you a  _wholesome_  dinner." She gestured at the computer. "Get off that and go do something. Go play baseball outside in the  _fresh air_."

Roxas slurped from the can. "I'm  _doing_  homework, and you can't play baseball alone, anyway."

After a stare off, she rolled her eyes to the side and disappeared down the hallway, waving the spatula in time to the Grateful Dead humming from the kitchen stereo. Only when he was certain she was gone did Roxas reopen the browser. He went back to working on the profile for his newest roleplay character; something he knew would be able to compete with the most sought after people on the forum. Currently, the biggest writer on the board was 'Spiked_Monotreme,' and his coding skills made Roxas wonder what he'd been doing for the last thirteen years of his life. Logically, he knew there was no way he'd be able to catch up with Monotreme's skill set, but Roxas knew how to play to a person's interests. From what he'd gathered, Monotreme liked mythological alternate universes, so Roxas had checked out a book of Greek myths from his library and decided to copy Icarus' myth.

_If I have done any deed worthy of remembrance, that deed will be my monument. If not, no monument can preserve my memory._

Or so said Monotreme's tagline, and Roxas had memorized it simply from gazing at his posts and reading through his interactions with everyone, except  _him_. After picking at his dinner while his mom reminded him to eat  _all_  of his oily potatoes, Roxas spent the rest of the night solidifying his new character down to its two-toned hair, incredible wingspan and heterochromia (left purple and right green). Before going to bed, he posted his new character information with a slight shake, even double-checking his grammar. But he didn't stay up long enough to see if Monotreme would bite the bait. Roxas' ass had already acquired the swampy feeling from where it'd been seated in one place for too many hours, and he needed to shower before he took a can of Frebreeze to the chair cushion.

"We've got to do something about your technology romance," his mother said, watching him climb the stairs to his bedroom post-shower. "I don't believe in underage marriages."

"I'm not online half as much as everyone else."

"I don't believe that, but nice try."

Roxas tumbled out of bed the next morning with the introductory post on the brain. Rubbing his fingers through his wild hair, he ran toward the computer room pre-cereal and ignored the blaring CNN theme coming from the living room. He didn't sit down as he typed in his login information and continued to look over his shoulder while the low-speed Internet contemplated logging him in. The screen stalled white and then the post finally appeared on screen with an inaudible  _pop_. Someone _had_  commented on his post, and Roxas shoved the mouse over so hard it shot off the desk and clattered to the floor. He yelled through clenched teeth, knelt down for it and heard his mom's approaching footsteps. Panicked, he snapped upward and stared at the screen, reading the username first. As planned, it was Spiked_Monotreme, but Roxas quickly noticed the reply wasn't long enough to warrant the signature prose that was Montreme's eclectic style. In fact, from the brackets surrounding the text, Roxas knew it wasn't even in character. Breathless, he read the comment out loud to himself.

"Heterochromia is a woman's trait?" Roxas dumbly stared at the condescending message before muttering under his breath. "What a  _dick_."

"Th' hell are you doing on the computer this early?" His mom walked into the computer room with cowlicks reaching for the hand of God. She was clutching her steaming mug between both hands, and the rim hovered beneath her bottom lip with a soft tremble. "Don't make me get Pentecostal and put a history tracker on that thing. I don't know  _what_  could be so interesting on a computer at..." Her eyes darted toward the inherited grandfather clock. "Roxas, it's half past six."

"I read BBC News," he said too quickly while reading that comment over and over.

"Smartass." She pointed toward the door. " _Out_."

Roxas unwillingly pulled himself away from the desk after logging off. His mom swatted his lower back with a snort when she spotted his equally unruly hair, but Roxas sagged his shoulders in response.

Spiked_Monotreme wasn't around much longer, eventually posting about his 'much needed' hiatus because he was entering Honors classes and traveling, making roleplay impossible. While the boards lamented his sudden disappearance, Roxas was more than  _happy_  to see him go. That single comment had been the last of their interaction, and while Roxas had accumulated casual roleplay partners who preferred to use email, he hadn't been able to make the kind of strides Monotreme had, and the failure was revolting.

Roxas understood that, in order to affluently write and code, he was going to have to be educated or educate himself, which led to his own competitive outlook on life. But like Monotreme, Roxas soon realized academics and a high maintenance relationship with the computer didn't go hand-in-hand as much as he wished they would. Not to mention, he wanted to play baseball in high school, so his middle school practices grew competitive enough to send him and his best friend, Hayner, into literal fights that'd given them both bloody noses and threatened suspension from the team.

The days of opening pictures of his favorite characters in Paint to redesign as his own lessened, and while he attempted to maintain his online friendships, Roxas eventually allowed them to die casual deaths. He too entered Honors during his freshman year of high school, and he'd been allocated a spot on the junior varsity team alongside Hayner, who then introduced him to smoking his mom's menthols and expensive booze runs funded by his job as a waiter at Buffalo Wild Wings. Roxas' once vaguely lonely life had acclimated to the kind of stereotypical popular existence one expected from a blond haired and stormy eyed conventional beauty. Other students wrote sonnets about him in their notebooks, the testosterone flooded his physique, and he was soon shoving McDonalds down his throat while sporting abs outside of the weight room, sweating and pushing his weight from side-to-side while waiting on his coach to unlock the door.

"You're a fucking joke," Hayner said.

It was the end of their junior year and Roxas had just tugged on his varsity jacket. He licked the ends of his fingers and attempted to wet a cowlick down, but it defiantly sprang higher. They were standing in the locker room after a gym class session that'd turned into Athens-style Olympics. "Why's that?"

"Mom told me to be more like you last night. She said that to me over mashed potatoes. You ruined my meatloaf night that was just for  _me_. Mom made that for  _me_. Not for you to ruin with your omnipresence."

"Only you would think meatloaf night is a good night." Roxas stared into the bathroom mirror and arched one of his darkly defined brows while shoving his fingers through his hair. "Don't be jealous."

"I'm not jealous. I'm annoyed."

"I treat you right, Hayner."

" _Right_. Can we go to class now?"

Roxas hissed through his teeth with a lopsided smile. "You must be mad if you  _want_  to go to class."

"I'm one more late class from detention and one more detention from coach reaming my asshole."

"Will you feel better if I make you meatloaf?"

Hayner walked out of the bathroom and Roxas followed with a short jog. They fell in line together, pushing through the crowded hallways, but something caught Roxas' eye. He stopped in mid-step and paused to look at the nearest bulletin board sporting the all capitalized, lime green, insidious bubble letters that spelled 'think college.' If there was one thing he'd been avoiding, then it was considering everything he'd have to consider in order to enroll into a 'good' college. His mother had insisted he take an athletic scholarship, which was the plan, but he was also looking at the potential of an academic scholarship, too. It was why he reached for the brochure regarding Ansem University, which was eye catching mostly because of its high resolution image of  _The Thinker_ seated in the center of the school's courtyard. The school was rigorously competitive, known only as accessible to the most involved Advanced Placement acolytes, but he continued reading even when Hayner jerked him forward.

"Can we not think about college right now? I'm barely passing trigonometry."

"I might apply here."

Hayner stopped and then grabbed the brochure. "This place has a shitty sports program."

Shitty sports program aside, Roxas kept the brochure on his desk and dutifully read it from front to back three times throughout the duration of his next class. That night after practice, when he handed it to his mother, she sat down at the kitchen table and mulled over the goal that she considered entirely from left field.

"You do realize you're going to have to get every scholarship under the sun to go here, right?" She grabbed her clunky Dell and opened up the school's website. "I can't afford this, Roxas."

"Don't worry," he said before flexing. "I can pay for it."

While Roxas remained an intrinsic part of the baseball team, the obsession with getting into a reach school without having to pay a dime manifested over the duration of the next six months. Between standardized testing and pursuing all As, there wasn't much room for socializing, which was why – out of both subconscious loneliness and boredom – he'd found himself reentering his dependency on the Internet for some kind of social interaction. It'd been while researching for his Latin course, something he'd taken to avoid having to actually speak a different language in front of other people, that he reignited this social media affair. Roxas had been shoving quotes into a search engine when he discovered a group of what he initially thought were pretentious college students pasting text on top of Photoshop collages of Hellenistic and Baroque art.

He'd quickly made an account on the blogging site, not fully understanding what exactly he was doing, just to follow said other people's works and maybe learn how to create his own. There was impending nostalgia in what he was doing, specifically when he was reading tutorials on how to properly code his own minimalistic theme. He was given a rush of remembrance of why exactly he was the person he was that day. The stark difference this time around was that he was cradling a MacBook Pro on his lap instead of festering in the computer room they'd long since converted into his mom's craft room.

Hidden away on his futon, he wove in and out of doing homework and fiddling with Photoshop layers over the next few weeks, growing frustrated with not understanding the program well enough. Eventually, after ignoring his translations until the ass crack of dawn  _again_ , he was able to post his very first finished graphic. It was about the Hyacinth myth, and he wasn't sure why it appealed to him. Roxas figured he just liked the idea of a god participating in gay sex, but there was also unspoken sympathy for untimely deaths induced by others. There was something about small towns that induced a kind of helplessness, inescapable quicksand.

Immediately after posting, there was a message in his inbox, and that glaring red notification startled him. He never received messages from the minuscule amount of people who followed his blog. One wary stare later, he clicked on the notification after setting aside his mug of coffee, and without hesitation, read the message out loud to himself.

"You're really fucking good at graphics. Where the hell have you been?"

Roxas read the person's username and it simply read as 'incoendefacio.' Roxas knew that had something to do with fire, and he decided to read his Latin notes a little closer from then on. He then clicked on the link to their actual blog and rolled his jaw as soon as he spotted the refined cleanliness of the theme's coding. A stark white background with an accompanying image of Botticelli's  _Portrait of Dante_  filled the sidebar and beneath the picture was a vaguely familiar quote. Roxas couldn't put his finger on why it was so damn familiar, but it was nearly crystalline.

_If I have done any deed worthy of remembrance, that deed will be my monument. If not, no monument can preserve my memory._

Out of curiosity, he clicked on another link that lead to pictures of 'incoendefacio,' and Roxas' mouth dried from a combination of intimidation and awe. Though he was strikingly tall and broad shouldered, his profile claimed that he was only nineteen. Nineteen or not, he'd clearly already lived twenty different lives in contrast to Roxas' mundane single one. Images of him posing with his collection of friends at The Louvre and pretending to make out with famous statues, along with self-aggrandizing portraits of his frighteningly alien features, peppered page after page of his blog. He exuded a kind of know-how self-confidence that made Roxas' cocky jock exterior seem like kitten food. Bold all black fashion, gleaming dark skin that caught the light like gold and blue glitter and eyebrows intentionally drawn short and traced red.

Roxas had never seen someone like him before. Growing up in a small town made for a lack of variety, and the man's red porcupine hair accented by absinthe eyes made a sickening sensation wreak havoc on Roxas' lower abdominals. They contracted on their own, and he quickly exited out of his blog after rooting for twenty minutes so that he could finally reply to the demigod. Had an androgynous man wore royal purple eyeliner in his hometown, then he would've been dragged into the woods and beaten before being dumped in a cow swamp. Threats aside, Roxas' mouth wetted from the entire concept of the other person's existence.

"I've only been doing it for a few weeks. I don't have a lot of time for stuff like this."

He stared at his reply, groaned and then deleted it.

"I…"

He deleted that.

"Thanks!"

He deleted that also.

"You're really hot."

He proceeded to exit out of the browser.

Roxas stared at the glowing screen in definitive silence only to click the Chrome icon and swallow. He returned to his inbox, read the message three more times and then articulated an answer that took enough effort to give him a lateral foot sprang.

"I haven't had a blog very long. Yours is legit, though. Dante, right?"

Self-satisfied because it'd made him seem both casual and intelligent, he sent the reply and stared at the keyboard in a ringing silence before suddenly becoming aware he was just waiting. Roxas stuffed his ear buds in and continued scrolling with a tired and inattentive tapping of the space bar, impatiently waiting for the red box to notify him that the other had replied.

The box appeared after a quiet ten minutes, and Roxas' fingers jerked across the pad with such force he punched his computer screen. He scowled at himself while rubbing his knuckles and opened the message.

"Nailed it. I love Botticelli. Are you a Classics, Art History or English major? No one else gives a shit about that kind of thing otherwise. Also – this might be too much, but can I have your name?"

Roxas stared, wondering why someone like this person would want his boring, Anglo-Saxon name. "I'm a senior in high school taking Latin. But you're a freshman, right? I'm Roxas. Got a name?"

"An infant, I see. It's Axel. I've been stalking your blog. Take that with a grain of salt, though. I stalk a lot of blogs. Do you know what you want to major in?"

He honestly hadn't thought about it, but Roxas typed the first major that came to mind.

"Philosophy."

This impulsive response was followed by apparent excitement from Axel who was a Classics major currently obsessing over his Epics course, and Roxas smoothly said his name out loud, appreciating the whispery follow through of the 'x.' It whistled out between his teeth, and he realized they weren't that far apart in age. Roxas would be eighteen directly after graduation, which was only a handful of months away. While he knew he had school in the morning (in three hours), Roxas couldn't stop himself from responding to Axel's growingly invasive questions. Invasive in the least negative connotation, at least. Roxas indulged question after question, finding himself opening Wikipedia in order to make sure he was comprehending every reference Axel made a point to drop just so that he could feel like he was on level. He learned a lot about philosophy in two hours.

Axel was a college freshman, nineteen-years-old, fluent in three languages, not including English (Italian, French and German), a Classics major with a pending English minor and his family was loaded, which explained how he afforded his private school and lived in the campus townhouses instead of traditional dorms. He was also taking Latin; his favorite food was peanut butter M&Ms, and he thought Roxas' hometown sounded like a national crisis. Roxas agreed with that last sentiment, and when Axel found out Roxas was an athlete, he added that he was also an Equine Scholar. This was followed by the names of his three horses; Hyacinth Picked, Black Temple and Pedestrian Unicycle or Hide, Templeton and Des for those who didn't care for formalities.

"I have school in a few hours, so I might have to cut this off soon."

Axel responded faster than he had in the entire past hour. "Do you have a Skype?"

"Do you sleep?" But he gave him his mostly unused Skype name.

His was 'roxas_th.'

Axel's was 'Spiked_Monotreme.'

Between the two of them there were a thousand miles. Interwoven with the World's Biggest Ball of Yarn, urbanites sucking down consumerism coffee, unmade beds, and golden wheat that met the waist; the span of space that gathered around them like heavy fabric was smoothed out by what became a fast friendship, balanced by a slow trickling of text messages and Skype chatting that all at once rained down like Niagara Falls. Roxas hadn't expected it, and so best friendships always seemed to grow that way. They built like cells, stacking and multiplying with no zenith in sight. Oxygen levels swayed and drifted to allow sublime growth, and while Roxas had once had a love affair with his smart phone, the introduction of Axel made it his constant companion; thumbs moving, heart racing.

"Ansem University is one of the best in the country. You'll dig it there."

Roxas was walking into his graduation. "It seems more like your place."

"Don't let that letterman weigh you down, Sunshine. You belong there."

"I've got to go. I'm walking in five minutes."

"Don't trip."

Roxas' mother plucked the phone out of his hand, fixed his graduation robe and kissed his forehead. She licked her fingers and attempted to tame his cowlick, but gave up and patted the small between his back before sending him to line up. That night, Roxas would leave his mother to drink Bud Light in the back of Pence's truck, Hayner would stick his tongue down his throat, and no one would talk about it again except Axel. For no reason other than drunken overstating, Roxas sent Axel a picture of himself hazed out with his friends, smiling and running his fingers through his hair with the sunset dripping behind them.

"You can't call me an infant anymore."

"You're still younger than me."

"Not enough for it to matter."

Roxas' summer should've been a culmination of goodbyes, overpriced beer from friends who required a 'pickup' fee and lazy mornings on Hayner's dad's pontoon. While many of those things happened, he was simultaneously attached to his phone, sleepily gazing at the screen while his fingers slid across the screen. There was something about every reply from Axel that sparked a kind of euphoric gratification, and he couldn't explain what it was, but he knew it was there. It was there because, when Axel was busy with his horses or out traveling with his family, Roxas' anxiety spiked from the lack of his company. He had an entire group of friends willing to entertain him, but there he was with waiting glances, wishing Axel would 'hurry the fuck up.'

"I'm taking your phone!" Hayner yelled, swiping the iPhone out of his palm.

Roxas lunged forward out of reflex and shoved him back against his car window. "Dude, give it back!"

"What're you even _doing_  on this thing? I bet you're on Grindr." Hayner snorted and began scrolling through his conversation with Axel. Roxas could see him devouring the messages, and his heart hammered. There wasn't anything condemning; maybe a couple of flirtatious texts from Axel when he was drunk. All of which meant nothing the next morning, but Hayner couldn't have scrolled back that far. "Roxas, who is this? We didn't go to school with an Axel."

"It's just someone I met! Don't be a dick and give me my phone."

"It's just a  _phone_ , Roxas! Stop acting so suspicious!"

Pence was laughing, but Olette reached forward and yanked the phone out of Hayner's hand. She locked the screen and then cautiously glanced at Roxas who was panting and ready to dig his nails into Hayner's throat. Handing it off, Roxas murmured a sincere thanks to her and then grabbed his greasy sack of fast food.

"Fuck you guys," he said.

Roxas shoved open the door and decided to walk home, much to Pence and Hayner's annoyance. He dug out his phone and relayed the entire incident to Axel who hadn't responded in ten minutes.

"You don't divulge a lot about your internet dalliances, do you?"

Roxas tensed at the word 'dalliance,' and quickly replied. "Don't use that word."

"It was a joke." And Roxas watched as Axel continued typing. "I didn't mean to touch on your sensitivities. I forget that, where you live, that's the ultimate taboo."

"Eat me."

"Gladly."

There was a pause on Roxas' end, and he rolled his jaw. "Gladly, he says."

"I already told you I put you in my phone as Hyacinth."

"Don't be weird."

Roxas pocketed his phone and ran his fingers along the back of his neck when Axel didn't reply. He waited an entire hour, wondering if he'd said the wrong thing. He'd never had the chance to indulge his thoughts about men outside of fiction, and so he was in between a rock and a hard place. Not that it mattered. At the end of the day, Axel was beautiful, and there was no getting around it. His mother had asked whom this 'Axel' person he spent so much time talking about was, and he'd reluctantly shown her. She'd gaped like a catfish, eyeing this 'child,' as she'd called him, and then looked at Roxas as if expecting him to say more. He hadn't, and she was visibly disappointed. Roxas had a feeling she'd been hoping her son was hooking up with American Royalty.

The point was Axel was a primordial figure, and Roxas was a redneck from Alabama who was only by chance going to a college in the rich New England area. When Roxas glanced at his phone again, by then sitting on the living room floor watching Mel Gibson movies with his mother, Axel had replied almost twenty minutes beforehand. It was getting late where Roxas was, and it was even later for Axel, but Axel had a proposition.

"Want to video chat?"

Roxas stared at the text, finished chewing and then wiped his greasy fingers off on his sweats with the kind of heart thud that made his throat ache. His mom pushed the back of his head with her foot because he was being gross, but he just laughed and leaned forward as if nothing was wrong.

"Right now?" He typed back. "Right this minute?"

"Right now. Right this minute."

He stood up to throw away his trash and made a beeline for the bathroom so that he could inspect his face, nearly tripping over his mom's cat, Buddha, in the process. His cowlicks were in a love affair with the humidity, but there was nothing he could do about it, and really, was it all that new? Axel had seen pictures anyway, heard Roxas' agonized complaints, so he figured the man knew what to expect in regards to his looks.

When his laptop was open, postured on his desk and elevated to give him decent lighting (something he'd made sure of by using Photo Booth), he yelled to his mom to tell her he was going to bed and then shut the door with a sharp snap. Locked and alone, Roxas pushed his ear buds in and logged into Skype, and as soon as he did, Axel hit the video call button. This sent Roxas into a trembling panic, and he stared at the call alert, drinking in the ringing before finally clicking to answer as if he'd been shot.

The camera spent too long loading, projecting a gray loading screen that made Roxas want to eat his teeth, but then with a snap, Axel appeared leaned off screen and reaching for something. He noted Axel's glazed shoulder that was tan and much more defined than he thought Axel was in general. Suddenly, Axel leaned back over on screen with a coffee mug in hand. A green stare he'd only seen emulated by photos flickered toward the camera and Axel smiled in a way that was infectious enough to make Roxas smile back.

"Hey," he said with a subtle roll of his jaw.

Roxas apprehensively paused and then glanced to the side. "Hey."

He'd known Axel was beautiful, but Roxas had told himself it was the complimentary lighting. That wasn't the case. Axel was dressed in a black V-neck, looking ruggedly casual with his hair pulled back into a bun and a thick headband keeping his mess of red off his face, and when he brought the mug to his lips, his long fingers appeared covered with excessive silver rings. Roxas didn't realize his gawking was noticeable, and Axel didn't seem to care either way. He was subtly doing the same thing, but unlike Roxas, he had tact.

"This only took three months," Axel said and then set his mug down before he leaned forward. "What's shaking, Hyacinth?"

Roxas ran his fingers along the edge of his desk, and he didn't know what to say. "Not much since I almost punched my best friend's teeth down his throat."

"Sounds primitive."

He grinned. "Primitive because of an iPhone. What about you?"

Axel rolled his wrist and then pointed toward an off screen window. "Templeton was being a little bitch, so I was out there with him from noon 'til the end of the day. My ass is practically like steak tartare. And then Grandma was giving me the 'extension of my DNA' guilt trip yesterday, so before riding I had to hangout with her and hear that 'your appearance is trash' lecture she gives me, because artificial hair means she can't show me off to her clucking hens. I'm forever damaging the fucking cockle of her heart, but whatever, Gran."

Roxas paused, surprised to hear Axel speak so casual and crude. He'd expected something more refined considering everything he wrote in texts and through Skype was borderline academic. While his brain processed the lack of formality between them, Roxas leaned back in his chair. He was shirtless because that wasn't a big deal on his side of the country, but it was a little surprising to Axel who reached up and dragged his fingers along his high cheekbones.

"Makes me glad I just have my mom."

"Dead Head Momma? Your mom sounds awesome. Bet she doesn't wear Chanel bought by marital dick sucking." He rolled back his shoulders and winked at Roxas. "What about Dad? Is he out of the picture? I don't think I've heard about him."

"Mom was a Teen Mom," Roxas started. "Dad was a Teen Dad, and he's now remarried with four kids."

"Brutal," Axel observed. "Got daddy issues?"

Roxas paused and snorted, only somewhat offended. "None I've dealt with."

Axel paused and kept staring at the screen. "I wasn't expecting this."

"Expecting what?"

"Everyone in the south looks like incestuous tzatziki sauce, but you look really good." Axel swallowed. "But whatever, Southern Peach. I don't mind surprises."

"You've seen my pictures, so don't act surprised. I look like everyone else here."

Axel cocked an eyebrow. "So you think."

"So I know."

They awkwardly stared one another down, not sure how to go on with the conversation because there was an awkward weight between them. Through the vaguely flirty text messages and Roxas reiterating he was straight, something was climbing the back of his throat. Axel was an opportunity he all at once realized he was too old to pass up. His fingers flitted toward the keyboard, but he realized this time he was going to have to speak. He was about to go to college ten hours away, and his mother wouldn't be there to comment on his life choices. Not that he thought she'd care, but he wasn't prepared to face the consequences of coming into himself.

"Can I say something without you getting weirded out?"

"I can't promise that, but I can promise to  _pretend_ I don't find it weird."

"Right…" Roxas inhaled through his teeth and scratched at his temple.

After an awkward, hesitant contemplation on Roxas' side, Axel spoke. "Are you going flake on me?"

He flinched at himself for being embarrassing. "Long distance really isn't my thing or whatever, and I don't know if it's yours, but I just thought I'd let you know that I really dig how you look, and I like that you're pretty smart. Even when you're talking about your horses I want to pay attention because you're really into it, and it's cool to see someone excited about something like that. That and I just think we have a lot in common, you know? Philosophy and Classics; it's obvious." By then Roxas' face had gone from tanned golden brown to a ruddy red. "And I'm not using this to experiment or anything, but…"

"Okay," Axel breathed out to stop him. "Whoa, there…"

"I'm not a horse."

"You can say that to humans, too." Axel leaned forward some more, resting his elbows on his desk. "You've got to quit being an indecisive straight boy with me, Roxas. Are you into it or are you not?"

"I don't know." Roxas sputtered out. "All I know is that I like you more than anyone else right now. But you're like really out of reach. Look in the mirror, and you have horses…"

Axel's face twitched as he tried not to laugh at the 'you have horses' statement. "I'm not asking for a label, but I am asking if you'd suck my dick?"

"Wait a second…"

"Look," Axel raised both hands in defense. "It's the end of the world, and I'm all that's left. What would you do?"

"A lot more than suck your dick."

Axel dropped his hands and grinned.

"Don't look so self-satisfied," Roxas murmured, rubbing his hot face.

"I'm  _not_." Axel tapped his fingers on the desk and thought. "My parents would hate you, and I think it's important we get that out of the water before I humor this."

"I'm not asking for you to commit to anything."

"But you're going to at some point."

When Roxas scoffed, Axel laughed a little, and Roxas' heart thudded again. The palpitation jarred him, and he looked at his nails instead of Axel who tilted his head and kept looking at Roxas as if inspecting cargo.

"Maybe," Axel started after hearing Roxas' silence. "Maybe if we're still talking by Christmas break, if things look good, then we could hangout in person."

Roxas glanced up at that and swallowed. "We could."

"People change a lot their freshman year, so I won't hold you to it." He scratched along the nape of his neck. "No pressure, Roxas."

"No pressure, Axel."


End file.
